The now-missing account, which posted under the name Docnetyoutube, has a documented history of promoting fake stories. But even with his profile gone, the seeds of the lie had already been sown and spread across the conspiracy ecosystem, driven by right-wing activists and self-styled conservative journalists.
One of the most widely-seen tweets promoting the video was also recently deleted. It came from an X user calling himself @TheWakeninq, who uses variations of the name “QAnon76” on other websites. But the video, as BBC journalist Shayan Sardarizadeh noted, had obvious hallmarks of being a deepfake, with distorted facial features and a foreign-accented voice that was out of sync with the speaker’s movements. While the alleged victim is a real person who, according to his social media presence, did graduate from the school where Walz once taught and coached, other videos on his Facebook account capture someone who looks different and speaks with an American accent. According to his Facebook account, the now-adult former student—who did not immediately respond to a request for comment—has previously experienced homelessness; a Gofundme from 2021 said that he was living in Hawaii and trying to “get off the streets.” The video is still up on @TheWakeninq’s Rumble page, where it has been viewed by at least 6,000 people.
This is so premeditated it’s disgusting. They didn’t fart out a fake person with AI, they targeted a real former student of his who they knew probably wasn’t going to hear what they’re using his likeness for due to being homeless. To take someone who is already that vulnerable and use their images for a scam like this needs to result in a prison sentence.
Every time he posts anything on twitter, the replies are filled with that bullshit accusation. Nothing but weird right wing craziness. He did a speech about how him and kamala harris are both gun owners and the don’t want to take away your guns. The replies were all “YOU ARE LYING! YOU WANT TO TAKE AWAY OUR GUNS!” It is so fucking exhausting…
I can’t imagine being a right wing person. Living in a constant 24/7 fantasy where all truths are lies and all lies are truths. Its so fucked.
Oh it’s even worse than that. MAGA folks are entirely driven by soul-shaking fear. Imagine being scared and angry every waking hour and how exhausting that must be. Not to mention but those responses literally suppress activity in your prefrontal cortex and reduce executive function in the brain. It sets up a feedback loop of poor decision making and fear/anger responses.
We need something like those cult deprogrammers, but that can work on roughly 100 to 150 million people.
Maybe we could start blasting cat videos in adds for NFL and NASCAR and stuff, tuck in some subliminal messages encouraging therapy.
Cat videos are known to be calming and stuff.
As someone who left Fundamentalist Christianity, it is exhausting. Your paradigm is constantly “under attack,” because reality has this way of not giving a fuck about your paradigm. And as long as people are generally trying their best to exist within and discover/communicate that reality, the hand of some nebulous, ever-present enemy will always be against you.
It’s fortunate for them that they’re able to tamp down the cognitive dissonance, or they’d likely stress themselves to an early heart attack.
Weird. Sounds like Breitbarts source on Nicarguan prisoners being trafficked across the border. If a man spreads lies and disappears, was there ever a lie at all? /s
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